A close shave
by NascentRaconteur
Summary: It was a simple plan. Of course, a plan so simple could never be counted on to go as intended..


**_'A close shave'_**

_"So... today's not off to a great start,"_ Yuffie thought.

It was a generous understatement. She wondered how her day had gone from a generally promising beginning to her hanging off the edge of a cliff by a single hand whilst desperately trying to avoid being spotted by the group of enemy soldiers that was hot on her trail.

She and the rest of Avalanche had been on their way back to Edge following their sojourn to the western continent to investigate rumours of a new threat to the planet said to be on the rise. That rumour had turned out to be little more than hot air, or so it seemed. On their way back home, however, they began to notice that someone seemed to be following _them_. She'd picked up on the mysterious group before the others did, and convinced her friends to take a more circuitous route on the way back, so as to put them off their scent. So far, no luck. The group in question seemed to know their every movement, and was setting up small garrisons and encampments all over the area between the Junon harbour and the capital in order to intercept them.

She had tried to dig up more information on the group chasing after them. 'Deep-something-or-other', or so she had overheard. Not that she really cared what they called themselves. One group of jack-booted thugs was the same as the next, she figured. In any case, her comrades-in-arms didn't seem to be taking this new threat seriously enough in her opinion, so she decided to take matters into her own hands.

The plan was simple enough. Sneak into the enemy encampment under cover of darkness, do some quick sabotage to delay the squadron chasing after them, and then get the hell out of dodge. Getting spotted halfway through her mission by some snot-nosed rookie and having to perform an unscheduled exfiltration post-haste under a hail of gunfire, only to wind up dangling off the precipice of the steepest cliff this side of Fort Condor was definitely _not_ part of said plan.

And yet, here she was.

She'd left Avalanche's campsite in the middle of the night without alerting anyone to her absence or intentions. In retrospect, that had not turned out to be such a good idea. With no help coming, she was left with a choice between falling to her death, or risk climbing up and being gunned down as soon as someone spotted her.

Her left arm had been injured during her escape, which left her with only her right arm supporting her whole body weight, and being that it was now some time since she'd almost dashed head-first off the edge of the cliff, her good arm was starting to grow numb, as well. On top of all this, as an unnecessary addition to her long list of woes, it was starting to rain, which wasn't helping with the whole holding-on-for-dear-life thing. The only upside was that the enemy had lost her trail.

For now.

"This sucks," she said to herself. As she did, she thought she could hear one of the soldiers pause and turn his head in her direction. She reminded herself, not for the first time in her life, not to voice her thoughts out loud.

When caught in a situation like this, she knew, the first rule was not to look down. It didn't take her long to violate that rule, only to remember why it existed in the first place. Save for a few jagged rocks, there was nothing to break her fall, which was a sheer drop down a good fifty feet, at least, terminating at the edge of the enemy encampment, which consisted of little other than hard concrete. If she somehow managed to move over a little, she might crash into a lower part of the cliff instead, but as far as she could tell, the landing would be just as fatal.

She tried to pull herself up, but her arm was too tired. All she could do was hang on and hope that the soldiers would move on to another area or give up on the search entirely. How she was going to get up and away afterwards was another matter. Since she hadn't possessed the foresight to tell any of her friends where she was heading, they'd probably just figure that she'd gotten bored and absconded to somewhere without notifying them, as she tended to do.

She sighed, cursing her ill fortune. Perhaps, if she was lucky, some good Samaritan might just pass by in the nick of time and and help her up. Or perhaps the soldiers would finally leave, allowing her to gather what strength she had left and risk using both arms to pull herself up.

A minute or so passed in relative silence. Though she couldn't see what was happening, she could hear the soldiers' footsteps moving further away from her location. She could feel a small spark of hope growing within her. Maybe she would get out of this whole mess unscathed, after all..

_Well, that is to say, if you don't get spotted by the soldiers down in the garrison below first, and they start taking pot-shots at you, and then you fall down and end up decorating the pavement, anyway, _her brain chimed in, sounding rather more cheerful than the situation warranted.

"Shut up, brain. Nobody asked you," Yuffie muttered under her breath.

She gritted her teeth, doing her best to maintain her grip on the rain-slicked rock surface. Hanging off of precipices like this one wasn't exactly a new experience for the young ninja, but the injury on her left shoulder was making things a little more difficult than they needed to be. Despite her best efforts to will her fingers to keep their tenuous grasp on the treacherous cliff edge, she could feel that she was slowly starting to lose her grip. Worse yet, she noticed that the rock itself was starting to give way. She redoubled her efforts, as though sheer stubbornness would intervene on her behalf. Then something occurred to her. Something that, given the urgency with which she'd been forced to flee, had all but slipped her mind. Her cell phone.

_"I know what I'll do. I'll just call for help,"_ she thought. _"Great idea, Yuffs. Why didn't I think of that before?"_

_Because you didn't want your Avalanche buddies to know how royally you've screwed the pooch? _her subconscious taunted her.

"Keep quiet," Yuffie muttered, fishing her phone out of her pocket with her free hand. "I swear, you're like a frickin' Greek chorus.." she added as she did her best to dial for help. She would suffer the embarrassment if it meant living to take revenge on her newfound enemy another day.

Dexterous though the young ninja was, dialling the intended number turned out to be a little trickier than she'd expected, what with the ceaseless rain and general numbness permeating her upper body. She had just managed to press the last digit when the phone slipped out of her hand, disappearing into a tiny black dot as it fell to the ground, making a dull, though audible, clatter as it shattered into pieces.

"...Crap."

She turned her attention back to trying to keep from falling. Another few minutes passed, as she clutched on to the crumbling rock face. She knew she had to do _something_. At the very least, she was resolved to hanging on to the cliff edge until she couldn't anymore. But she knew that she would eventually have to let go. With that in mind, she decided to make one last, desperate effort to haul herself up.

Her efforts turned out to be futile, as the rock itself finally gave way, sliding back even as she tried to pull herself up. _"This is it.." _she thought, wincing and wondering if she would have time to feel any pain before the end.

She kept her eyes closed, but couldn't feel anything. She wondered briefly if it was already over, and she simply hadn't noticed. It took her a moment to realize that not only was she not descending, but not actually moving at all. It was only when she dared to finally open her eyes again that she became aware of the intense pressure of someone gripping her by the wrist.

"Gotcha," a familiar voice said, bringing her attention back to the present situation.

She looked up, but couldn't see who it was that had intervened at the last moment.

"Give me your hand," the voice said.

"Huh?" she replied, still a little dazed by the whole experience.

"Your _other_ hand," the voice said, growing impatient. "I can't pull you up like this."

Shaking herself out of her disorientation, she raised her left hand up, and caught the other hand being offered. "Hold on," her would-be rescuer said and, with some effort, began to pull her back up over the edge.

She knelt on the ground for a moment, catching her breath, before finally glancing up at her saviour. "Cloud?" she asked. "What are you doing here?"

"I was about to ask you the same thing," Cloud replied, crossing his arms. "You're welcome, by the way."

"Yeah... uh, thanks," Yuffie said, dusting herself off as she got back up to her feet.

Cloud walked off a little ways, digging his phone out of his pocket and dialling someone. "Hey, Teef. It's me. You can call off the search. I found her."

A brief pause.

"All right. We'll see you soon," he said, closing the phone and placing it back into his pocket. "What were you doing out here, anyway?" he asked, turning his attention back to the young ninja.

"Well, I just, um.." Yuffie muttered.

"You were off on your own again," Cloud said. "You had us worried sick."

"Don't get all melodramatic on me, Spikes. I'm fine."

"A few seconds later, and you wouldn't have been," Cloud pointed out.

"I was just trying to help out, okay?" Yuffie replied, growing a little defensive.

_"Here it comes,"_ she thought, sighing. _"The Big Lecture."_

But, to her surprise, Cloud simply nodded. "All right... Just don't wander off like that again, okay?"

She nodded, but said nothing in reply, perhaps because she was still feeling embarrassed about the whole thing. Fortunately, it seemed like Cloud was willing to let it slide. She wondered what had gotten into him.

"Come on, let's head back," Cloud said, gesturing for her to follow him. "I parked a little further off."

She made to follow him, but a sudden, stabbing pain in her lower leg caused her to collapse to the ground again. She hadn't noticed just how hard she'd banged against the cliff wall when she'd fallen over, and her predicament had left her little opportunity to spare much thought to anything other than hanging on.

"Are you hurt?" Cloud asked, turning back to the young ninja.

"I'm fine," Yuffie said, pushing herself back to her feet again, hobbling forward a few paces through sheer stubbornness before stumbling again. He caught her as she fell, then slung her arm over his shoulder, assisting her as they walked back over to the road.

"I said I'm fine," Yuffie insisted, growing red-faced.

"Don't be stubborn," Cloud said. "You try to walk with your leg in that condition, I'll end up having to carry you all the way back to our camp."

"But.."

"It's all right," Cloud said, turning towards her. This time, there was no hint of irritation in his voice. If anything, he looked at her with a surprising tenderness. Sensing that their conversation was growing somber, she couldn't let the opportunity slip to needle him a little bit.

"So... you were worried about me, huh?" she asked, her familiar, impish grin surfacing on her features.

"You shouldn't have left like that," Cloud said. "It was reckless and stupid. But yeah, I was..."

He paused, correcting himself._ "..we_ were worried."

She looked at him, trying to decide whether or not he was being serious, and whether that little verbal slip was something for her to interpret as meaningful or not. He paid no attention to her occasional glances, focused as he was on getting them back to his bike. Perhaps it was just fatigue talking, she thought. He and the others must have been out here searching for her for some time, after all.

They walked on in silence for a bit, when a thought occurred to her.

"Hey," she said, looking up at Cloud again.

"What?"

"How did you know I was here?"

"Lucky guess."

"Really?"

Cloud shook his head and shrugged. "Your cell phone. It sent some kind of emergency signal. Something must have triggered it. Good thing it happened when it did. Otherwise, I'd never have found you."

"Oh.."

"Well, we're here," Cloud said as they reached the road where he had parked Fenrir, careful to keep it out of sight. He moved the bike out of its cover, sat down, revved up the engine, then gestured for her to take a seat. "Get on. Let's go."

She did as he asked, seating herself behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist. A moment later, they were off on their way, heading back to Avalanche's campsite. At the speed they were travelling, had it been anyone else behind the wheel, she might have been worried. But, reckless though Cloud's driving seemed, she'd never known him to suffer an accident while driving, even under the most exigent circumstances. She knew it was safe for her to simply lean forward, rest her head on his shoulder, relax, and enjoy the ride.

The wind whipped at their clothing as they drove on, causing the long ends of her bandana to trail behind the bike. The cool surge of air felt refreshing as it brushed against her face which, despite the cold, was close to burning up due to her prior exertion.

As she closed her eyes, she noticed something else, a warm sensation which brought a smile to her face. Whether out of concern, or just an unconscious gesture on Cloud's part, he'd placed one hand over hers, as though to assure himself that she was indeed safe.

She didn't mind.

* * *

**Author's notes**

Well, there you go. A bit of unadulterated Clouffie fluff for the sort of hare-brained reprobate who enjoys that kind of thing (hint: me!).

That's all for now. I might be persuaded to do a quick follow-up if anyone's interested. In any case, questions, comments, thumbs-ups and ill-tempered harangues go into the shiny box below this space. Thanks for reading.


End file.
